Vilho Lampi, The Great Expanse

The rich fields of Liminka, formerly seabed, are bright and spacious. The great expanse punctuated by rows of dark hay sheds was the physical and spiritual home of painter Vilho Lampi (1898–1936). In his home town of Liminka, Lampi painted self-portraits, the children of nearby farms, their interiors and the landscapes around them. Although Lampi’s artistic career spanned only 15 years, he experimented with various visual styles ranging from rough-hewn expressionism to New Objectivity and the delicate pointillism of his final years.

All his life, Lampi sought balance between his strong artistic calling and the work at his family farm Matinlauri. He spent his evenings and nights painting. Lampi’s summertime paintings radiate with the light of the late evening and the nightless night. The large and powerful paintings of his heroic period show individuals as hard, proud, even aggressive, while still lives made after a trip to Paris in 1931 using a very smooth painting technique highlight the artist’s own perception and the quiet significance of objects.

The exhibition shows Vilho Lampi’s key works from the 1920s and the 1930s. The collections of the Oulu Museum of Art are accompanied by works lent by museums, private collectors and companies. The exhibition also features virtual augmented reality (AR) models and soundscapes by Tiina Wallin, Otso Ritonummi and Saku Vääräniemi, students at the Oulu University of Applied Sciences.